Le Contrôleur des Wagons-lits

Le Contrôleur des Wagons-lits ("the sleeping car controller") is a French comedy in three acts by by Alexandre Charles Auguste Bisson (1848-1912)[1].

Also found as Le Controleur des Wagons-lits and Le Controleur des Wagons-Lits in some sources.

Translated and adapted into English as On and Off by H.B. (Henry Brougham) Farnie (1836-1889)[2]

The original text

The French play was originally performed on at the Théâtre des Nouveautés, in Paris on 11 March, 1898

Translations and adaptations

In 1913 a silent film called Le Contrôleur des wagons-lits was made of the play, the script by Georges Monca directed by Charles Prince.

Performance history in South Africa

1904: Performed in English as On and Off by the Le Roy-Duret Company in the Good Hope Theatre, Cape Town, in April by a company under the management of the Wheeler Brothers, featuring George Giddens.

Sources

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandre_Bisson

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Brougham_Farnie

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Contr%C3%B4leur_des_wagons-lits_(film,_1913)

D.C. Boonzaier, 1923. "My playgoing days – 30 years in the history of the Cape Town stage", in SA Review, 9 March and 24 August 1932. (Reprinted in Bosman 1980: pp. 374-439.)

F.C.L. Bosman. 1980. Drama en Toneel in Suid-Afrika, Deel II, 1856-1912. Pretoria: J.L. van Schaik: pp.203-205

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